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How To Make a Plant-Based Diet Delicious and Sustainable
Three pieces advice I wish I knew when I changed my diet three years ago
I was lucky to spend New Year’s with family, including a cousin who suffers from severe arthritis and is working to change his diet. Despite flare-ups and bone degeneration necessitating surgery, he confessed over dinner, “I love burgers and fries and if I’m out on the weekend, it’s almost impossible for me to resist fast food.”
I went through a similarly dramatic diet change three years ago to reduce chronic inflammation and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that willpower alone won’t lead to long-term change.
When I removed dairy, soy, corn, alcohol, and processed sugar from my diet, I spent the first few months willing myself not to eat things I craved and missing the pleasure of eating what I wanted. What finally shifted my experience was the realization that a plant-based diet- and here I refer to a diet primarily based on plants and whole foods- offers as many possibilities for pleasure, flavor, and creativity as the diet I had before. But I had to learn how to create them.
The following tips are exactly that: what I wish I knew three years ago about how to make the switch to a plant-based diet not only sustainable, but delicious.
